Shadow Liaison
by Cataclysmic
Summary: Dawn Summers, junior Pentagon liaison just got a new job.
1. Shadow Liaison

Title: Shadow Liaison.  
Author: Cataclysmic  
Rating: PG  
Summary: Junior Liaison to the Pentagon Dawn Summers just got a new job...  
  
Disclaimer: I don't own any of the characters in this story, I make no profit from this, and all characters are owned by the Stargate and Buffy people, I am just borrowing them for awhile.

As Dawn Summers entered the elevator of the top secret military base in Colorado, she couldn't help but wonder at how far she had come since Sunnydale.

It was only around three years since the collapse of Sunnydale and the final destruction of the Hellmouth. Despite the fact that demons still roamed the earth and there was a major new Hellmouth emerging in Cleveland life was going well for those who had escaped Sunnydale.

Buffy, Giles and Xander had set themselves up in Cleveland, ready to take in the multitude of Slayers that kept popping up. Faith was generally found in the general vicinity of Cleveland continuing her on again, off again relationship with Robin. The rest of the Slayers who had been activated at the Hellmouth had either gone home or had tagged along to Cleveland.

Perhaps the most extraordinary thing was that the Slayers were now being paid, by the United States Government if you could believe it. In fact that was how Dawn Summers, former Key and resident of Sunnydale had ended up as a junior liaison for the Pentagon.

Buffy had, in true Buffy style waltzed into the Pentagon demanded this that and everything refused to leave until she got it and told them to pull up the files they no doubt had on her. Which eventually they did and before they agreed to provide funds for the Slayers.

Dawn stared down at her neatly pressed blue suit. The Pentagon of course in exchange wanted to be kept up to date on the goings on of the Slayers and eventually it had been decided that Dawn, who wasn't doing much else at the time, would act as a liaison between the Pentagon and the Slayers. It was a somewhat odd arrangement but all in all it was kind of nice.

As she was led down a corridor to a briefing room she couldn't help but notice that the place was awfully grey, basically there were two shades she had seen of the base so far, grey and her escorts green uniform.

She still wasn't entirely sure what she was doing here. When she signed up to work with the Pentagon everything had been very specific, she was supposed to act as the go-between for the Slayers to the Pentagon. Just the Slayers, nothing else.

However she couldn't bring herself to refuse when Major Paul Davis had come to her office to offer her a junior liaison position to a Top Secret project in Colorado, he had specifically come to her because he had been told she was used to dealing with 'the strange, unusual and weird'.

She would still be dealing with the Slayers; she would just be working with this SGC place as well.

Major Davis had not been able to tell her much about what went on out here on, or rather under the mountain explaining that she would be briefed when she arrived, and to prepare for a shock.

When Dawn walked out of the briefing room she was actually quite calm, so aliens existed, big deal, she believed in demons, witches and vampires what was a few aliens into the mix?

Her life had just gotten that much more interesting.

She couldn't wait to get started.


	2. Possibilities

Title: Shadow Liaison.  
Author: Cataclysmic  
Rating: PG  
Summary: Junior Liaison to the Pentagon Dawn Summers just got a new job...

Spoilers: up to Season 5, Proving Ground for Stargate, Season 7 Buffy.  
  
Disclaimer: I don't own any of the characters in this story, I make no profit from this, and all characters are owned by the Stargate and Buffy people, I am just borrowing them for awhile.

* * *

They had given her an hour to regain her bearings in yet another briefing room, she snorted, like she needed it. She knew that despite the fact she had been recommended to Major Davis because she was used to dealing with weird stuff, no one had bothered to tell him how weird that stuff was, or for that matter what her current project was, or what made her so special and different from all the other junior liaisons that worked for the Pentagon. She knew this because part of her deal to work for the Pentagon was that the only person that could impart knowledge about the Slayers to Pentagon staff or anyone else for that matter was Dawn. She was the only person working for the government who was authorised to 'induct' people to Slayer or Demon knowledge. It was done so that someone they trusted would know what was going on, so only people she trusted would be able to find the Slayers, so that nothing like the initiative would ever happen again. The Slayers appointed their own liaison to the Government, the Government just employed them. Being an exception to the rule worked well for Dawn as it saw she had a lot more power than other junior liaisons and indeed often more than a full liaison would be granted, it served to make her a somewhat unique commodity in the Pentagon. She still did the occasional 'normal' job for the Pentagon so as to not raise too many eyebrows but all in all she was normally run ragged with everything the Slayers needed. When Major Paul Davis began looking an assistant, someone able to handle the outlandish nature of the SGC he had evidently gone to her superior in his search, one of only a handful of people who knew what she really did.

She now had an hour to digest a concept that she had already accepted after about five minutes thought, and to make matters worse she had nothing constructive to do during that time. Base security had confiscated her laptop and mobile as she entered the base, most likely so she wouldn't be able to contact outside before she had been given the clearance to do so. Not that there was actually anything she used for work on the laptop, she wasn't stupid enough to carry information on the Slayers into a Top Secret Military base in her laptop and hope that they wouldn't find it. But at least it had solitaire, as well as some more interesting time waster games. Her mobile was likely taken so it wouldn't interfere with any of the equipment, not that she suspected it would work underground anyway. Checking her briefcase just to be sure she found she was correct in assuming she had nothing of interest in it, just a couple of spiral notepads and pens nothing that could not possibly keep her entertained for any period of time.

The briefing had gone well, even though it had been exceedingly long. But despite its length it had been incredibly interesting so she was willing to forgive them. So far she had learned a great deal about an artefact called the Chappa'ai or Stargate, which created a wormhole between one Stargate and another and apparently served to transport humans and aliens across the galaxy. The Stargate was thought to have been built by the Ancients, extremely advanced alien dudes and the SGC's job was to bring back advanced technology for earth especially advanced defensive technology as well as stop Earth from being invaded by aliens.

Personally she thought they were a little understaffed for the job, but that was just an initial thought and as she hadn't seen the rest of the base yet or how the SG teams operated she was willing to withhold judgement, for now.

The explanation of the theory of the Stargate was followed up by a summary of what the SGC did and an explanation of the Goa'uld, system lords and Earth's allies. Following their brief explanation of the Stargate program they had left her to her thoughts with a promise to see it later, it being the Stargate. A lot of the information they had given her had only been covered in brief and as far as she was concerned would need to be covered in greater details or investigated at a later date. The explanations given in the briefing were just that, too brief.

She looked around the briefing room, it was just as drab as the other one, though certainly more homey, with fake looking wood lining the inside of the briefing room, a big improvement from the drab grey hallways. The briefing room also had two national flags hanging in the corners of the room. Patriotic much, she supposed she should have expected it, being an American Military base and everything inwardly hitting her forehead, off course there were going to be flags, good thing too because they added a bit of colour.

She tapped her fingers against the table for a few moments before once again looking to her watch. She was so bored and she still had another fifty minutes before they would be back to get her, and continue with the explainy thing.

Obviously Major Davis hadn't given Mr. Boss Bosses word much weight when he was told Dawn was used to dealing with strange stuff, because she was going to be stuck here for another forty five minutes 'digesting' what she had already accepted and was ready to move on with.

Finally she decided she was not waiting in this room a moment longer. She had noticed when they left her here that they hadn't locked the door behind them, no need really what with the security cameras and the 'escort' they had likely left outside the door. She suppressed a snort, an armed 'escort' of course. Since they had been so kind as to leave her a guide she may as well take advantage of him, in a non taking advantage of him kind of way of course. After all, she figured said 'escort' would know where some other people were someone for her to talk to, or at least, where the cafeteria was, she decided she may as well make use of him. Because after taking an hour to get to the base and through security, three hours of being briefly briefed and an additional fifteen minutes being bored Dawn was beginning to get the munchies.

After a quick glance at the camera, well the visible one anyway, there were probably others her mind reasoned she made her way to the door.

* * *

MP Hugh Ryan was surprised when he noticed the door to the briefing room he was watching opened to reveal the leggy brunette from the Pentagon he was supposed to be guarding.

Subtly keeping his eyes on her he did as he was trained to do in these situations and pretended to be watching the hallway instead of guarding her.

She did not seem at all concerned about her actions and seemed perfectly at home with the fact he was armed and guarding the hallway outside the briefing room.

"Excuse me, I was wondering which way it is to the cafeteria?"

As if she didn't realise she were under guard and this was a top secret base with extreme security concerns.

"I do not believe you have permission to be wandering the base M'am"

Hugh replied steadily though inwardly he was wondering about her, he had been told before starting the shift that he would be guarding a new junior Pentagon officer who had just been told about the Stargate and aliens for an hour. It had only been fifteen minutes since she had been taken in there to think things over, he knew soldiers who had taken weeks to before they even began to believe what went on here, and some of them had seen some seriously weird shit in their time. Yet here she was asking for directions to the cafeteria as if nothing out of the ordinary had happened.

"Never said I couldn't though." she stated shrugging one shoulder.

She was probably suppressing, didn't want to believe what she had been told and pretending it had never happened in the first place. Pity, he wouldn't of minded having the leggy brunette around a bit more.

He supposed there was no harm in it, after all she probably wouldn't be coming back and he was meant to be guarding her not the hallway anyway and she already knew about the project.

"This way M'am."

The cafeteria was a veritable gold mine of information about the Stargate program Dawn thought as she tuned into another conversation between members of different SG teams.

So far just from eavesdropping on a few conversations she had picked up a lot more on the Goa'uld and other peoples they had run across than the afternoon briefing could hope to cover.

And it didn't hurt that they had some pretty decent food down here.

The MP from the corridor had taken her to the cafeteria like she had asked, and separated himself from her not far from the door, though he was not seated far away and glanced in her direction every few minutes, she pretended not to notice.

She didn't know what possessed the top military brass to build Top Secret Military bases and being underground anyway, well ok so it was probably more secure but every time she thought about how many metric tonnes of dirt and rock just _had_ to be over her head it made her more than a little queasy, which was not a good thing considering she was thinking about it at the moment and she was eating. Luckily her mind had been elsewhere this morning and she had not had time to think about it.

Turning her attentions back to her surroundings she noticed a young female air force officer had seated herself opposite her. It was about time she had a chat to someone here instead of just listening to them.

* * *

Watching the feed from the base security cameras General Hammond decided to just ask the question that had been on his mind ever since he had first heard about Major Davis's peculiar new recruit from Lieutenant Stephens, the young man who had briefed her this morning.

He had been surprised, not only by the fact they were to have a junior liaison assigned but also because it was rare for anyone brought into the Stargate program to react as calmly as Dawn Summers had when told the majority of the major dealings of the SGC involved aliens of some kind.

Dawn Summers though had barely batted an eyelash and had remained calm enough throughout the briefing to ask intelligent questions. This had thoroughly impressed Lieutenant Stephens but brought doubts to General Hammonds mind.

"So Paul, what can you tell us about your latest cadet Dawn Summers?"

"Not much sir, when it got out that I was looking for someone new in my office one of my superiors at the Pentagon called me up and recommended her for the position. When I told him I was looking for someone more qualified than a junior liaison he told me he was confident she would be more than capable for the job,"

"What was she working that he would think she would be able to handle the SGC Major?"

"When I asked sir, I was told I was not cleared to know about the other project she is working with but sir, for someone that junior as her she sure had some friends and contacts in high places. Certainly whatever she is working on it doesn't match up with any sort of assignment given to a junior liaison I've seen at the Pentagon."

"Is it possible she could be NID?"

"No sir, I don't believe so, I trust the man who recommended her sir, and although I don't know what else she is working on I do know he knows about the dangers the NID poses to the SGC and does not want them involved. I don't think there is a possibility that she is working for the NID."

"There's always a possibility Major."


	3. Doubts

**Title: Shadow Liaison.  
Author: Cataclysmic  
Rating: PG  
Summary: Junior Liaison to the Pentagon Dawn Summers just got a new job...**

**

* * *

**

Spoilers: up to Season 5, Proving Ground for Stargate, Season 7 Buffy. Some things that happened in either show may not be covered the same way here general principals still apply.

Disclaimer: I don't own any of the characters in this story, I make no profit from this, and the Stargate and Buffy people own all characters, I am just borrowing them for a while.

* * *

**_Chapter 3: Job Descriptions._**

The day was finally done, her MP had taken her back to the briefing room after she had finished lunch and Lieutenant Stephens had continued with his briefing on more basic background information.

Now that she had more time to digest what she had been told about the project she was beginning to have some doubts. She knew that at this point things could still go either way and she could get out of the assignment if she really wanted to. She had some thinking to do…

Growing up, for the better part of her teenage years amongst supernaturally strong female warriors had definitely been an advantage for Dawn.

Not only had it snagged her a really cool and reasonably well paying job at the Pentagon, a place she never would have broken into otherwise. Of course growing up with such strong female guides also left her with a lot of not entirely misplaced feminine pride and often termed stubbornness, which often got her into trouble. Namely when she got it into her head that just because she's female that it did not mean she couldn't do everything a male could do and more, well normal males anyway and there was a distinct shortage of those in her life before she moved away from the Hellmouth.

Of course growing up with Slayers, Witches and Vampires had also taught her about limitations, namely hers, and humility, once again hers because really Buffy and Faith not so much with the humility. Then again most days she wasn't much with the humility either.

But anyway, growing up in the environment she had gave her a lot of opportunities she otherwise would not have. Like a job that gave her a lot of power over the government and her various bosses at the Pentagon and skills she otherwise would not have developed.

She also believed that dealing with what she had in Sunnydale even the routine week to week problems, and the often times strange things she had been forced to deal with had helped her to become a stronger and better person than she would otherwise have become.

But she still wasn't sure if she was strong enough for this.

It wasn't the aliens that had her worried, well maybe a little considering their planet was at war with a whole bunch of them and she hadn't even known. But that really wasn't that worrisome; the SGC it seemed had the matter well in hand.

It wasn't even the physical training she would have to complete if she accepted the job. Apparently the SGC had recently instigated a mandatory self-defence course for all non-military personnel entering or already in the employ of the base. In the physical sense she was in pretty good shape, no where near Olympic level or anywhere near what some of the soldiers on the base were but she could keep up if she had to, even if she would be a little behind. She knew she would fairly speed through the self-defence training because this wasn't the first time she had had a crash course in self-defence. Working with the Slayers she had picked up more than a few little tricks for overpowering people stronger then you, namely vampires but either way. Not to mention Spike had taken her aside and given her hand-to-hand and basic sword training. She knew she would never be on an expert level at any of that sort of stuff but she could hold her own if she had to. Basically the training provided was 'what to do when the bad guys attempt to kidnap you' training, which apparently from what she could ferret out was a fairly regular occurrence for those who knew what was really going on in the SGC at any given moment, which she would become if she took this job.

Nonetheless, they, the lessons, promised to be more fun, and a lot less damaging, than the lessons she had received from various Slayers and Vampires over the years. The lack of supernatural strength would result in a lot less bruises.

No the thing that really worried her about working for the SGC was not the kidnapping, the training or the war it was the lying she would have to do and possible security risk she would be to the project.

She was not stupid enough to believe that if the Emerald Foundation found out about what went on here that they would leave it alone.

The Emerald Foundation was what the new council had decided to call itself publicly. The name was actually relatively new and named after the first Slayer to die after being activated by Willow, Emerald Valdez who had died in a freak demon uprising in Kent. It was supposed to serve as a reminder of how much the Council now Foundation cared about everyone it was involved with, cared about each and every slayer and that their deaths would now be remembered and appreciated somewhere other then in some old musty book.

But the important thing was that she would need to keep it from them, preferably until the military was ready to announce the existence of the Stargate, or it got blown out in public by some faction or another at which point she knew she would be in trouble.

And if she took the job and they somehow found out that she was no longer primarily working for them but on behalf of another organization as well, specifically a military organization which was often on the brink of saving or putting in danger the world things would be much worse.

She knew that they would most likely look at the project as another Initiative where the military had taken on something they did not understand and could not handle when although they had taken on something they initially did not fully understand they now did and they were handling the problems they created.

The Emerald Foundation would not see things that way, they would come in on their high horses take over and likely due to the fact they really did not know anything about what went on here stuff it all up.

Not that she did not think that the SGC couldn't do with a little Slayer help, it was just that from what she had seen so far she thought the military were the best people to run the place.

The truth was that she wanted to work here, at the SGC, as their liaison to the Pentagon or vice versa. It was something she had earned all by herself not thrust upon her by her sister, friends and Giles. It wasn't as though she did not enjoy the job she had been given it was just that it had been given to her really and not earned. This was something she was offered because she did a damn good job.

So she would need to figure out just how she was going to do this. There was no doubt in her mind that it would be difficult. Hell they had given her a lecture about just how difficult it would be when they had introduced her to the program. Not only would she have to worry about lying to her family and friends there were other things to consider, like the Slayers who just happened to 'drop in' on her now and then. No doubt on Buffy's orders.

Her task was of course made easier by the technology available to her, years of computer expertise picked up from Willow over the years would finally come in handy.

In any case she would figure out precisely how she was going to make this work later. For now it was enough that she had decided to take the job. She could work out the finer points later.

* * *

"Enter"

MP Hugh Ryan made his way into General Hammond's office. He knew he shouldn't of taken that leggy brunette out of the briefing room…

* * *


End file.
